Into the Fire
by sunnyamazing
Summary: Pre-Rise: She needed time away. He was left behind. She is determined to rise. He is trying not to fall.
1. Part One

**A/N:** The moment Beckett said "_Yeah well, two months of listening to crickets in my dad's cabin was driving me nuts._" this story was born. I unfortunately had to write some essays before writing this. But tonight I had some time and this is what the muse wrote.

Set pre-Rise, almost the morning before we see Beckett back in the precinct.

Thank you to the magnificent Mali Bear's Buddy for being my beta and to my Castle girls for keeping me sane or should that be insane?

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><p><strong>Into the Fire.<strong>

The noise startled her from sleep, not that she was sleeping soundly. She's forgotten what it is like to sleep soundly, forgotten what it was like before the face of her mentor flashed before her eyes every time she closed them. It isn't just his face she sees now, she can see Castle too, hear his voice, hear his pleading calls.

It's starting to become too much, keeping this all to herself is starting to wear thin.

The cracks are starting to show.

She sighs and pulls herself from bed, taking a blanket with her and wrapping it around herself as she walks towards the window of her father's cabin. She stares out into the blackness, listening to the noise that woke her, the damn crickets.

The crickets don't shut up, they don't silence themselves and they refuse to go away no matter how many times she's pleaded for them to. She smiles a wry smile, the action still feels foreign, it seems the crickets have become a metaphor for her own life.

The things she wants to silence don't go away, no matter how hard she tries, the faces, the flashbacks, they still remain. Her break up with Josh also doesn't fade, his face staring at her, seemingly in disbelief as to what she is saying. She didn't mention Castle, but Josh did, he asks if she's breaking up with him because of 'Rick,' the way he said Castle's name made her shudder, the hate clearly evident in her now ex-boyfriend's voice. She told him it wasn't the case, she doesn't know if he believed her. But she really doesn't care.

She liked Josh, she really liked him. He was everything she thought she should have in her life, but it wasn't enough. It was never going to be enough and as she shivers against the cold she knows that nothing has been enough since the night her mother failed to come home.

She spins her mother's ring between her fingers, she's taken to wearing it all the time since the shooting. It's something she can reach for in the dead of night and remind herself that, once upon a time, when the ring was on her mother's finger, the world was a happy and safe place – at least for her.

She had a phone call today, her NYPD-mandated therapist has passed her psych evaluation, she's been cleared for active duty. He called because she hadn't, she explained politely that she hadn't received the papers because she was out of town. He was understanding and supportive, everything a therapist should be. He told her she had done well with her sessions and he was confident as to her progress. That he was satisfied enough to send her back into the field. She thanked him politely and said nothing more as her father had been watching her intently.

She shakes her head, her father hasn't mentioned the call and neither has she, she knows that he has reservations about her going back. He hasn't voiced them but she can see them every time she catches him staring at her for longer than he needs to. If he thinks she's giving up because of what has happened then he's wrong. This hasn't weakened her resolve, perhaps it's even strengthened it.

Roy. Roy died to protect her, died because of secrets that have been kept for too long, lies that had been kept hidden beyond the light of day. She won't stand for this anymore, she will uncover the truth no matter the cost. But no matter how close she comes to the rabbit hole, she cannot uncover anything from the confines of her father's cabin.

Silently she drops the blanket back onto the bed and fumbles in the darkness for her clothes, her car is here, her father's best friend bought it to her two days ago. She's cleared to drive, she's cleared for active duty, she won't let anything hold her back,

She could rise or she could fall.

She's determined to rise.

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><p>The noise of the car ignition startles him, it's easy to do when there is nothing but silence outside his bedroom window. He quickly climbs from bed just as the car disappears from sight. He knows who it is, and knows where she is going. Katie is going back to the city, back to put her life in danger again. Back to run into the fire, back to stare down darkness.<p>

He knows he cannot stop her, she's every bit as determined and stubborn as his Johanna was, and as he says a silent prayer he cannot help but wish that he had the ability to change the things he cannot.

He sighs, before retracting the last part; he wouldn't change his Katie for anything. He just wishes she'd make her peace with her mother's death just as he has had to. He needs Katie to realise that her life is worth more than her mother's death. He needs her to realise that he wouldn't survive losing her too; these months since the shooting have proven that.

But still he lets her go now because he knows he cannot stop her. He stares out into the night sky, there is nothing but darkness now and he sends a silent plea that his Katie not be consumed, that something good can come of all of this pain.

He walks slowly into the kitchen, flicking a light switch as he enters the room. There is a note leant against the kettle, he unfolds it and reads the five words inside. His daughter is determined and stubborn, but she's also caring and smart and those are the characteristics he will hold onto in the dead of night when the darkness threatens to consume him.

Neither of them will fall into the fire, at least not willingly. When it is light he will make his way back home, but for now he will just stand there and think.

He'll think about what could have been.

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><p>The sun is rising as she sets sight on Manhattan for the first time in months; she has left the crickets and their metaphors of her life behind and now she's back and another new metaphor springs to mind.<p>

She's stepping back into her old life as the sun rises, and she can't help but wonder if she's walking back into the fire.


	2. Part Two

**A/N: **I felt that the first part needed a companion piece from Castle's side.

Set the same morning as the Beckett piece.

Thank you to my beta and to my reviewers, you are all amazing and I treasure you all.

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><p><strong>Into the Fire.<strong>

His eyes open. The room is dark. He doesn't know if he was sleeping. He can't remember.

Sleep doesn't come easily anymore. He's forgotten what it is like to sleep soundly. He's forgotten many things.

Or they've forgotten him. Sometimes he thinks she's forgotten about him.

Months have passed. She hasn't contacted him. She told him she needed time. He didn't think she'd meant this much time. He's starting to forget what life was like before Montgomery's funeral. He feels he's floating in an endless fog that never seems to come to an end.

He can still see her if he closes his eyes. He can hear her telling him that some things are best not remembered. That the shooting is something she can't remember, something she's forgotten.

She's forgotten what he can't. She doesn't remember what he can't forget.

He imagines her nightmares aren't filled with thoughts similar to his. His nightmares concern her face, her eyes closing, her body shaking and then stopping still. The worst nightmares don't even involve what actually happened, the past changes while he is dreaming, it's **her** laying dead on the hangar floor, it's **him** crumpled over her body, pleading for her to come back.

His days are filled with the search. The hunt is on for who hurt her. For who had a sniper shoot her. His nights are filled with writing, or they were. He wrote late into the night, for weeks on end. He swapped things around, he changed things, he made what happened seem clear in his own mind. He tried to make the best of the bad situation he found himself in. He doesn't know if it worked. Today he will find out.

Silently he pulls himself from bed, he takes his robe from the chair and pulls it over his shoulders. It's early as he takes slow steps out into the main room of the loft, he moves towards the window. The streets beneath him are quiet. New York isn't awake yet. He shouldn't be either.

He catches a glimpse of a clock, it's hours before his book signing. It's even hours before Paula will call to make sure that he is on schedule. She'll call with her threats of fire ants eating him in places that should be treated nicely and he knows he'll comply. He has enough problems without adding Paula to the mix.

Yesterday he thought he'd made a breakthrough, that the files he'd been chasing might be a lead to something. But the files are gone, burnt to a cinder in a fire. He scoffs at the metaphor, the files are burnt and his life feels as if he is stepping into the fire. Everything he touches seems to turn to ash lately.

He spends his days here, alone. Alone in his study. He can't go to the precinct. Gates made sure of that. So he stays here. He works a case that needs a team of the finest cops behind it. Not just a writer.

There's no file he hasn't read at least twice. There's no end to the phone calls that come from both Esposito and Ryan. One has taken to whispering over the phone as things are simply no longer the same as they used to be. The other doesn't whisper, he simply creates more questions.

There are too many questions and there aren't enough answers. The fire is closing in.

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><p>She stands on the stairs, she watches him from a distance. The room is dim but she can make out his familiar shape. His body is hunched over, his features schooled as if he is deep in thought. This isn't new. Her son has looked like this for months.<p>

She can pinpoint when it began. The moment is engrained on her own memory. He'd arrived home one night, deflated.

He didn't let her see his disappointment; her son is the master of the poker face. But she's his mother, she knows when there is something wrong with her only child.

There's been a significant decline in the number of calls from a certain brunette, decline meaning none. No calls from her at all. Martha knows what her son told the brunette while she lay bleeding at the cemetery. It hasn't been mentioned since.

Martha can only speculate that it wasn't reciprocated and her son has been left teetering on the edge. Caught in limbo. Caught between the flames of the life he wants and the life he's been left with.

She leaves him alone. He won't benefit from one of their mother-son conversations right now. As much as she'd like, this isn't a problem a mother can fix. She'll just think about what could have been.

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><p>The hours have passed. Hundreds of books are being thrust at him for signing, they come accompanied by compliments, by smiling women.<p>

Then there's one voice. Her voice. Her voice burns through the fog. Her voice brings him into the fire. To burn or to fly. To crash or to rise. He doesn't know which.

But it is something. It's a start.


End file.
